Nobody was home in the early morning hours Tuesday when a fire swept through an older mobile home near Riverdale and burned it nearly to a crisp.

Marc Kirby and his wife Krysten just happened to be spending the night with a cousin in St. Louis when Kirby got a call on his cell phone about 3:30 a.m. informing him that his home was on fire.

They raced back to the 1972 mobile home - an extension had been added - only to find it fully engulfed.

The Kirbys had no insurance and little money.

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But perhaps the most painful loss was their baby son’s ashes. The infant had been killed in a traffic accident in 2009.

The container had popped open and the ashes were simply, gone,

Also burned was the baby’s memory box that contained several items of his, his grandmother Linda Kirby said.

Two Chihuahua puppies were killed in the blaze and a gun cabinet that his grandfather had made, a collection of about 3,000 videos, along with a 22 foot fiberglass sailboat are all gone.

“We lost everything,” Kirby said, adding that they had just completed some remodeling.”We have nothing.”

Kirby, 32, says he is a landlord. He rents out another mobile home but he won’t kick the renter out as a lease was signed.

He has no other income.

He shares custody of his two daughters with his first wife and he has two other children who have been living elsewhere.

Shortly after he arrived at the fire, he called his mother and said, “We’re homeless.”

“You can’t explain what it’s like to see your home go up in flames,” he said.

He has been staying with relatives but is in real need of a place to live.

“We really need a bigger place, we need five bedrooms,” he said. “But we have no money. We have nothing.”

The couple had lived in the mobile home off Douglas Road, just inside Montcalm County for about four years.

The cause of the blaze isn’t known, he said. It may have started with a refrigerator or stove, but Kirby said its his understanding that there had been a gas leak

He is certain that if anyone who had been in the home that night would be dead

If you would like to help Kirby and his family, he may be reached at 989-621-9681.

About the Author

Linda Gittleman’s alma mater is Western Michigan University where she majored in speech and English and her hometown is Alma. She’s worked at the Morning Sun's Alma office for more than 20 years. Reach the author at lgittleman@michigannewspapers.com
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